Language arose from instinctive emotional cries, expressive of pain or joy.
The yo-he-ho theory
Language arose from the noises made by a group of people engaged in joint labour or effort – lifting a huge hunted game, moving a rock, etc.
The evolution theory
Language originated in the process of labour and answered the call of social need.
What is linguistics?
Linguistics is the scientific study of language.
Observing & questioning
Formulating hypotheses
Verifying the hypotheses
Proposing a theory
Branches of linguistics
Internal branches: intra-disciplinary divisions
Phonetics
Phonology
Morphology
Syntax
Semantics
External branches: inter-disciplinary divisions
Pragmatics
Psycholinguistics
Sociolinguistics
Applied linguistics
Computational linguistics
Neurolinguistics
Features of linguistics
Descriptive
Dealing with spoken language
Synchronic
Chapter 2 Phonetics
What is phonetics?
Phonetics is termed as the study of speech sounds.
Sub-branches of phonetics
Articulatory phonetics – the production of speech sounds
Acoustic phonetics – the physical properties of speech sounds
Auditory phonetics – the perceptive mechanism of speech sounds
The speech organs
Where does the air stream come from?
From the lung
What is the function of vocal cords?
Controlling the air stream
What are the cavities?
Oral cavity
Pharyngeal cavity
Nasal cavity
Transcription of speech sounds
Units of representation
Segments (the individual sounds)
Phonetic symbols
The widely used symbols for phonetic transcription of speech sounds is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
The IPA attempts to represent each sound of human speech with a single symbol and the symbols are enclosed in brackets [ ] to distinguish phonetic transcriptions from the spelling system of a language.
In more detailed transcription (narrow transcription) a sound may be transcribed with a symbol to which a smaller is added in order to mark the finer distinctions.
Description of speech sounds
Description of English consonants
General feature: obstruction
Criteria of consonant description
Places of articulation
Manners of articulation
Voicing of articulation
Places of articulation
This refers to each point at which the air stream can be modified to produce a sound.
Bilabial: [p] [b] [m] [w]
Labiodental: [f] [v]
Interdental: [] []
Alveolar: [t] [d] [s] [z] [l] [n] [r]
Palatal: [] [] [t] [d] [j]
